


Not-Rose

by iAmYou



Series: One Shots [2]
Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gen, Post Doomsday
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-18
Updated: 2014-05-18
Packaged: 2018-01-25 13:27:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 525
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1650245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iAmYou/pseuds/iAmYou
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's not Rose, he has to remind himself. Just something in her image.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not-Rose

She's not Rose, he has to remind himself. Just something in her image. Still, it's nice to pretend and she does it very well.

"It's 1863, the two armies met here at what would be the bloodiest battle of the war," says the Doctor. They're in the United States, Virginia to be exact, hiding in a house as the fighting goes on. "It's a three day battle, but only one civilian died." There's the sound of a body hitting the wall outside and not-Rose cringes. "We can leave at night when they stop fighting, if we're careful." He paused. "I'm sorry for bringing you here... Rose."

He blames her. Every time she's around him he has to remind himself that she's gone, can't ever come back. But there she is. The girl he never said 'I love you' to stands in the corner of the console room and he hates it.

When she's sleeping he restrains himself. She needs constant body heat when she's asleep and he's the only one there for it. He curses the damned telepathic aliens that had to go and create a body from his wishes, but he's stopped blaming her. It isn't not-Rose's fault she exists, after all.

The not-Rose is too quiet sometimes. She's a lot like Rose, but she doesn't blast pop music through the TARDIS and doesn't yell at him as much as Rose did. So he yells at her, instead. Blames her for not being Rose even after he told himself not to blame her anymore. "I'm sorry," she whispers and his hearts drop to his stomach. Even though she's not Rose, she is.

Not-Rose smiles at Martha when she meets her, smiles at Donna too. She smiles at everyone they meet and usually they smile back. He doesn't, usually.

It's during one of her sleep cycles that he realizes he's stopped calling her not-Rose in his mind. He only said it once out loud, and the expression on her face was something he'd take with him to his death, all his deaths he had left. She was Rose, not his Rose, but Rose nonetheless.

Rose smiles at friends and enemies alike. She smiles at him and usually, he smiles back.

*

He doesn't smile. He wants to, wants to do what little he can to calm her. The TARDIS is much too far away for him to get there in time, especially carrying her. The man that attacked her is dead at his feet and that is one death he can forgive himself for. Hers won't be.

"Sorry, Doctor," she murmers.

"What do you have to be sorry for?" He asks. He's sitting on a log in a forest on a planet three galaxies from Earth, she's lying with her head in his lap.

"Not being her," she says. He shakes his head. "Not being good enough."

"You're good enough, Rose. You've always been. Don't go, please." It's fruitless to ask that, he knows, but he doesn't care. "I love you, Rose."

"I-" she gasps in pain before she can say anything else and her body goes limp. He stays still for a moment before breaking.


End file.
